A classic party game that is easily adapted to the classroom.
Instructions:
The students stand in a circle, and one of them will be the “murderer”. This student will “murder” other students by winking at them.
To choose the murderer, you can either a) have them close their eyes, walk around the circle, tapping one student on the back, or b) put one square of paper for each student in a hat, writing “murderer” on one piece and “innocent” on all the others; the students silently choose a piece of paper to determine who is the murderer.
Now the game begins. If the murderer “winks” at a student who is looking back at him/her, then the student is “dead” and must sit down. (The “dead” student can exaggerate his/her death, but must not reveal who the murderer is.) The murderer tries to “kill” as many people as possible in this way, without anyone else discovering who the murderer is. If someone correctly guesses who the murderer is, the game is over and that person “saves” everyone who is still “alive”. However, if someone guesses incorrectly, then he/she is “dead” too, and must sit down.
As more and more people “die” and the group gets smaller, it gets very difficult to be the murderer without getting caught. You can therefore set a limit — say, 4 or 5 murders — after which the murderer is the winner.
Students will want to play this game over and over. It’s good to introduce after teaching the words “murder” or “innocent”. Otherwise, there’s not a lot of educational value to this game, but it’s a good icebreaker or a good way to break up a class, and if nothing else, the students will learn how to wink!